Recipe Makeovers: Lighten Up Classic Dishes

Learn how to take your favorite comfort foods from bad to good with our recipe makeovers. We promise, you'll never miss those extra calories! Find more delicious ways to lighten up your meals with low-calorie Italian recipes and light Mexican meals.

About 30 million households will serve this dish on November's big day. Too bad it's not as good for us as it tastes. We switched to low-fat milk and reduced-sodium broth, traded canned french-fried onions for oven-fried ones, trimming the total fat by 8 grams and dropping the sodium by 257 milligrams. Seconds, anyone?

Our slimmed-down take on this Sunday-morning favorite is practically saintly. Subbing in low-fat milk and egg whites gives it half the fat and a third less cholesterol than traditional French toast. Plus, it's a cinch to whip up. One more blessing in disguise: You can still serve it with maple syrup, which is naturally fat-free.

Cream, potatoes, and salt pork or bacon give classic chowder its rich flavor. What else they add: about 370 calories and 22 grams of fat per serving. To slim the dish — by more than half the calories and cholesterol — we trimmed the bacon, swapped reduced-fat milk for cream, and stirred in flour in place of several starchy potatoes.

This slimmed-down salad (minus 50 calories and 7 fat grams per serving) has just the right level of tangy flavor and no gloppiness. We used light mayo (and less of it than the regular stuff) and swapped whole milk for low-fat buttermilk to keep it moist.

The crunchy coating is what seals in the juices, giving this Southern standard its finger-licking flavor. Too bad it also absorbs so much fat. By stripping the bird of its skin, baking instead of frying, and ditching the batter for panko crumbs, our crispy cheat carves off 240 calories and 22 grams of fat per serving.

As we lightened up this Big Apple classic, we decided on a new motto: If we can fake cheesecake here, we can fake it anywhere. And we did, cutting nearly 200 calories, 21 grams of fat, and 141 milligrams of cholesterol, simply by using low-fat and fat-free dairy products and streamlining the crust.

It's hard to believe a salad could use an overhaul, but in the case of the notoriously high-calorie Caesar, there's room for improvement. We coated the croutons with cooking spray instead of olive oil, then replaced egg yolk with light mayonnaise to keep the classic dressing's creamy texture — without the classic guilt. Now 100 calories and 9 grams of fat slimmer, this crisper is ready for its reveal.

Here's a way to get crispy fish and potatoes without lots of oil. To keep the fat profile low, serve with our Low-Fat Tartar Sauce made with light mayonnaise and nonfat yogurt or simply sprinkle with malt vinegar.

Revamped, these gems are still ooey-gooey good — but they're only 80 calories each (with a gram of healthy fiber per cookie). We've also cut out half the fat and cholesterol you'd find in this treat's calorie-laden cousins. Lose the guilt — and indulge!

When it comes to holiday-time calories, nothing adds to your bottom line as much as this rich punch. But only a scrooge would give up eggnog altogether, so check out our slimmed-down nog at one-fourth the saturated fat and half the cholesterol. We replaced whole milk with low-fat (and skipped the heavy cream), but kept the silky texture and decadent flavor by simmering the milk and sugar with cornstarch and by using more egg whites and fewer yolks.

In the kingdom of comfort food, meatloaf is royalty. Rich in carbs and fat, it fills you up and makes you feel good — that is, until your waistband becomes too tight. To get the comfort without the calories, try this version. We've cut the fat in half by using 93 percent lean ground turkey instead of ground beef chuck, and opted for fat-free milk, which still keeps the loaf plenty tender. Even more soothing: You don't have to give up the beloved ketchup glaze.

Predictable: Our classic Mac and Cheese, with its 1 1/4 pounds of cheese, has 640 calories and 30 fat grams per serving. Surprising: Our revamped version, with reduced-fat cheese and low-fat milk, is just as creamy and flavorful but has only 420 calories and 12 fat grams for the same serving size. Bonus: M&C Lite packs 5 grams fiber (whole wheat pasta!). Serve this at your next gathering, and be sure to have copies of the recipe — fans will be clamoring.

A dessert with a vegetable in its name can't be that bad for you, right? Wrong. Good Housekeeping's own classic carrot cake recipe, with a cream cheese frosting that's killer (if we do say so ourselves), weighs in at 640 calories and 20 fat grams per slice. So we decided to create a carrot cake that you can enjoy without guilt. The new tally per serving: a slimmed-down 210 calories and 5 fat grams. For an even healthier treat, skip the icing altogether.